K-W's Good Son

K-W’S GOOD SON RETURNS HOME

“I feel like this is the record I’ve been winding up to make for about ten years. On the one hand it was grueling ‘cause we went through a lot of trial and error before we ended up really figuring out what we should be doing. I mean, on a few of the songs we went through two or three completely different productions of the song, from the drum takes all the way down the line. But in that process we eventually came up with something that just felt right.”

Rob Szabo is a lovely man to talk to. It’s rare to find someone who’s been at this arduous rock ‘n’ roll game for so long that hasn’t an ounce of bitterness in them. Instead, Szabo speaks of his work with a wide-eyed excitement, a bubbling joy that is extremely indicative of his recorded work. He’s someone truly grateful for every experience he’s had as a musician, and anxiously awaits the next adventure. His newest endeavour is a benchmark of sorts. He’s just released the very ambitious Like A Metaphor, a CD/DVD package that features new tunes, old re-recorded favourites, and a bonus DVD compiling three stunning new videos and a short documentary depicting his life on the road.

“Our goal with this record was to put together the best collection of songs that I have written to date, regardless of exactly when they were written, and present them in a way that I could translate live either with or without a band,” explains the lanky songsmith of his record’s mission. “I chose to re-record some old tunes for a few different reasons. First of all, I did more touring in the last year than I’ve ever done and it really hit home to me that in the big scheme of things I’m a totally unknown performer. It means people don’t know my history, they don’t know that I’ve already done eight records. When I play live I play songs from throughout my career, so if I’m playing in San Francisco and I play the song “Beautiful” and people really relate to it, they don’t care that it’s a five year old song that I first recorded with my old band, (Plasticine). They want that song! So I kinda feel like, for people that know my history, this is a new CD with a few greatest hits thrown in. For the new folks, hopefully, it’s a just a bunch of bitchin’ songs! Secondly, I’ve always felt like lots of the songs that I’ve done and been proud of never really got a chance, (due to unforeseeables like bands breaking up, or labels going bankrupt, etc.) So now that I’m committed to touring my ass off and getting the word out, I felt like I wanted to give them a second chance.”

Szabo certainly has a renewed vigor for the road. On the Good Son Documentary portion of the DVD, he speaks passionately of his commitment to playing as much as possible. “I’m going to tour like nutters. Two hundred shows a year.” And so he has. Taking his acoustic and his Danelectro all over North America, remaining steadfast in his goals, just bringing it every night. No matter where, no matter who’s there. Nowhere is this manifesto better exemplified than in the footage of Szabo wooing the punk rock kids in a fire hall in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, (a night immortalized in the new tune “The Johnstown Kids”). Between heckles of “Fuck Canada!”, Szabo manages to both trump the heckler and capture the unsuspecting hearts of those in attendance by showing them that punk and pop, Canada and America, aren’t so different after all. It’s this connection that keeps him touring and loving his job.

“Yeah, I still get excited about touring,” he says. “It gets a little funny when you do a really long stretch alone in the van. I did five weeks alone last summer, and of course you get lonely and it’d be nice to have a band around, but that comes with all sorts of other baggage too. I was never one of these guys who got into music because I wanted to get laid or be famous or something. The kind of people I look up to these days are people like Fred Eaglesmith, not necessarily from a musical standpoint, but the guy tours two hundred and fifty days a year! He plays to tons of people in every city in North America and is essentially unknown. I like that. And he has a real connection with his audience. There is no middle-man. He doesn’t have to depend on a label, or the radio, or video stations, or magazines. That to me is success.”

One place Szabo has always been able to rely on for success is Kitchener-Waterloo. Whether it was as the Bobby Baker look-a-like front-man of the Groove Daddys in the mid-90’s, one half of the ferocious dual guitar rock band Plasticine, or as the mature singer/songwriter he’s grown into, Szabo has always been embraced by the town he grew up in. His presence has been more sparse since he’s moved to the big city, (Toronto), but the scene he was instrumental in creating is still thriving and Szabo is glad he can still be a part of it.

“Do I still feel like K-W is my home? Of course. That’s where I grew up, cut my teeth, learned to play, and made my first records. That’s where I came back to after my first tours and that’s where I felt like I was a part of a scene at a certain time. I haven’t lived there for about five years so of course I’m somewhat disconnected, but I still have friends there and hear about what’s going on to a certain degree. I haven’t been feeling like a part of any scene for quite some time because I’ve been traveling lots, and that gives you a whole different perspective on things.”

Lately, Szabo’s career perspective is focused squarely on longevity and constant improvement. He is a dedicated writer and player and is purely interested in the continual betterment of his craft. This is his eighth release and over the course of those albums he’s seen every facet of the rock mythos. So when is enough enough? For people who love what they’re doing as much as Szabo, there is no such thing. All that matters is the next adventure.

“I like the thought of looking into the future at the records I will make and thinking that they will be way better than anything I’ve done to this point. I really kinda feel like I’m just getting started, just scratching the surface and really starting to figure out what the hell I should be doing. That may sound ridiculous considering I’ve done eight or so records already, but I’ve only just finished Like A Metaphor and if I find myself daydreaming it’s always about how we’re gonna make the next record, and what the sounds will be like. That really excites me. It makes me feel like maybe I’ve been doing something right. It’s really the only thing that consistently makes sense to me: keep on writing songs; keep on making records; keep on touring. What else is there?"

Rob Szabo will be releasing Like A Metaphor at the Starlight on April 29^th. He’ll be joined by special guests the Benefits Of Doubt, Charlena Russell, and Steve Strongman. Tickets are $10 in advance or $13 at the door. www.robszabo.com

(originally published July 2006. Echo Weekly. Kitchener.)